Angels and Reapors
by baynard
Summary: Humanity may be the new kid on the galactic block, but they've brought with themm some pretty cool toys and some radical ideas to challenge the cool kids with. Watch out reapors, you're not the only one with giant kickass robots
1. Chapter 1 Ain't that a kick in the head?

Summary: The salarian's have an intelligence network that discovered more secrets than it knew what to do with. The Asari's had commando feared throughout galaxies. The Krogans were the most frightening species to have ever stepped foot off Tuchanka. The Turians had fleet rivaled by none and soldier more obedient and willing to die than any other. What did humanity have? A little mix of each plus giant biologically grown kickass robots.

General Williams frowned as he examined the battlefield display in front of him. Every few seconds the normally crisp and clear holographic interface would fizzle and lose focus before coming back into view with sharp clarity. Shanxi was lost. He had thrown anything and everything he had at his disposal to slow down the avian invaders long enough for Alliance reinforcement to arrive, but with only a handful of colonial militia and an even smaller brigade of regular infantry grunts and measly caravan of tanks left, the battle had ended the minute the navy had collapsed. Still nonetheless, with what he had, General Williams had rallied his men to make a stand against the invaders. Humanity would not go down quietly, not here, and certainly not anywhere else.

A massive rumble shook the bunker, but the good general kept his foot even as dozens of other soldiers stumbled and cringed about him. The holographic TAC interface shorted out and turned dark completely, increasing the panicked activity of those in the small fortified room. Calmly the General turned to survey his soldiers, experienced eye noticing with detachment that most were younger than his own son who was only 24 and freshly graduated from the academy.

"General, power generator 3-9 are offline, we can't get a connection back up with the satellites!" Dozens of other reports were called out as men and women worked furiously in the half darkness to get more information for the General, but in his heart he knew it was over. Clasping his hands behind his back, the 50 year old man closed his eyes and considered his options. They had sent the signal out a day and a half ago when the invaders had first come through the uncharted relay. Reinforcements were probably en-route already, but not in time to save him and his men. He could surrender, and hope the aliens had enough mercy to spare his men. The thought of surrendering to an invader that had come to burn their homes sent a knot of cold fury in his stomach. No, he would not be surrendering. Opening his eyes, he noted that the general activity in the room had fallen down and most had turned to silently watch him. The solemn silence was punctuated by the respect his fellow soldiers radiated towards him, and the general felt his heart tighten.

All their lives depended on his decision. These men and women all had family and friends they needed to return to, and though they were prepared to lay their lives down for humanity, no doubt they wished to be able to return home and see their loved ones again.

"Sir?" The quiet question from the normally cheerful first lieutenant sliced through the air like a knife, and for a moment Williams simply wanted to lie down and go to sleep. The weariness he felt was bone deep and blissful oblivion called to him. But it was not in him to give up, not in him to simply roll over and die, and in the eyes of the men and women before him he saw that they too felt the same way. Shanxi was their home, and no one was going to give it up without a fight, even if they knew that fight would not end well for them.

"Break out the rifles. Get on the comm to all units, tell them to hunker down and fix bayonets. The Alliance will arrive, and we will kick these bastards off our planet!" Even as he spoke, the room broke once more into frenzied activity, the tension brought on by his moment of indecision gone. The call to march to their deaths seemed to put them more at ease than when Williams had seemed uncertain of what to do. As the general armed himself along with a sergeant who was snapping heat sinks into a bandolier pouch wrapped around her waist, the man reflected upon his life. Hands checking the standard military assault rifle with the ease of a lifetime of practice, General Williams thoughts went to his family. Two daughters, a son and a loving wife were his most treasured possession in the world. Closing his eyes, he pictured them standing together smiling down at him from the vineyard of their home back on Earth. 'I'm sorry' he thought silently to himself. Another thunderous crash shook the bunker, and this time only the dim emergency lights were left, those powered by a generator within the bunker itself. "MOVE OUT!"

Overhead, task force General Articus watched in satisfaction as the final alien ship disintegrated over the atmosphere. The battle had been more costly than he had anticipated. For a race that had not even mastered using kinetic fields for their ships, they had put up a surprisingly good fight. The ugly rectangular boxlike design of their massive warships was durable and took a slew of cannon fire to penetrate, and even more to bring down. The weapon of choice fired by the alien warship had been energy lances that had minimal range but had quickly sapped kinetic barriers with their splash effect when it struck, and missiles that were mostly countered by the guardian lasers. Their most effective weapon had been a close range projectile that when detonated send thousands of projectiles outwards rather than explosive fire. The deceptively simple weapon had wreaked havoc whenever it did manage to penetrate the hull of one of the Turian warships, often silencing the smaller ships with a single well placed hit. Though the task force had easily outnumbered the alien fleet three to one, the aesthetically unpleasing ships had given as good as they got, costing Articus half a dozen cruisers and a frigate. The fighters had been much more evenly matched, and from the quick glance he had made at the reports, the Turian general knew he would be writing many letters of condolences to send after this operation.

"Last enemy ship down." The announcement wasn't necessary, but as per hierarchy protocol it was the tactical officer's duty to announce whenever the final enemy combatant had fallen silent. General Articus nodded his head and flared his mandibles in a Turian smile. "Well done people. The planet doesn't appear to be populated enough to be their home world, so let's mop up this operation fast. We need to get as much information on this new species as possible, and I want a report sent back to the hierarchy about our success here. What's the status on the ground troops?"

"Most of their ground infantry has been driven into retreat though we're getting reports that the enemy troop had begun to hunker down and fight to the death. We believe orders may have been given to make a last stand."

Silently General Articus digested the report given by his first officer. Few species had the guts necessary to fight to the death in a straight up fight, the Turians being one of them due to their sense of instilled duty and honor, and of course the Krogan being the war mongering beasts that they were practically lived to make last stands. Silently Articus raised his own level of respect for the new species up by a notch. "Have the translation software finished their analysis enough to broadcast a request for peaceful surrender?"

A high pitched chirp interrupted his officer's reply and gasps and cursing filled the bridge as displays went haywire from the influx of sudden information.

"Report!" snapped Articus.

"Sir! Ship sensors detected a massive energy spike in one of the northern cities. A nuclear device of massive yield was detonated!"

Tightening his jaws slightly the general braced himself for bad news. "Were any of our troops deployed in the area?"

"2nd platoon had been mopping up resistance in the area sir."

Closing his eyes, the Turian general exhaled slowly. War always came with a cost, and though he knew his duty to the hierarchy, sometimes he couldn't help but hate the militaristic nature of the leadership. He had privately been against the idea of invading the new species without letting the council know in order to gain a new client race, and now his men paid with their lives for the Primarch's decision. No amount of metals or condolence letters will bring those men back.

"Have the Spirit of Vengeance and the Spirit of Honor fire over the position of the remaining alien resistance."

"Sir?" While not strictly forbidden by Citadel law, bombarding garden worlds with kinetic fire was still highly frowned upon and Articus could be court-martialed and found guilty of war crimes. But currently if that risk would save his men's lives, Articus was more than willing to take it.

"You heard me soldier. I will take responsibility for these actions personally. Send the orders."

"Sir!"

Closing his eyes, Articus listened to the hesitant affirmation from the two warships. 'Forgive me, you have fought bravely and deserve the honor to at least defend your homes. But if that comes at the cost of the lives of my men, then you will have to face death without being able to fight back.'

Another chirping beep filled the bridge and Articus felt himself tense once more. Had the aliens detonated another nuclear device?

"Sir we've got incoming bogies! They just entered through FTL jump at the edge of the system and is holding position next to the third planet!"

"Bring it onto the display!"

The friend or foe display of the tactical map zoomed out to encompass the area where the enemy forces were holding position and the Turian felt his mandibles twitch in surprise at the number of red displays that showed up. Already he was outnumbered almost four to one, and still more foe displays were appearing as ships arrived in system.

"Order the pickup of as many of our troops as possible! Send the Sound of Silence back through the relay to warn the Primarch!" As the display continued to fill with a dizzying amount of foe displays, Articus felt acidic bile back up his throat. _It looks like we may have poked a sleeping giant._

AN: just a random thought that came to mind. Evangelion vs Reapers anyone? Won't be a strict crossover since there will be no characters borrowed from the Evangelion universe, just the ideas. Hopefully get to see some Eva's in action next chapter.


	2. Chapter 2 know thy enemy

Saren Arterius grunted as he moved forward towards the cover provided by the burnt out shell of an alien combat vehicle. At one point it had been a tank of sorts, one different in design from it's turian equivalent but retaining the same characteristic cannon that made it's classification undoubtedly that of a tank. The fate of this combat vehicle that had defended the planet had been the same as every other one of it's kin, destroyed in an instant by a quick bombardment from precise strikes from missiles sent by 2nd division fighters.

'Sure could use some of those damn fighters now." thought Saren sourly. The offensive to take the ripe garden world with the large civilian population of newly discovered aliens with a paltry orbital and ground defense had seemed like a perfectly good idea on the planning table. In fact it had seemed like a good idea when the task force had arrived in system and blown away the handful of defending cruisers and fighters scattered in orbit over the resource rich planet, and had seemed perfectly reasonable as the turian invasion force had chewed up the few ground based resistance the aliens could muster.

That had been a week ago. A week before they had quickly discovered that intel had once again been everything but right. Apparently this was not the aliens home world, and they had not been a quote, "most likely peace loving society that saw little need for a military based off of their large civilian population yet having laughable defenses in place."

If he ever got off this spirit forsaken rock he'd find that half painted moron who thought this plan up and remove his fringes one by one. A massive fleet had arrived in system, the number of enemy ships had sorely outnumbered the turian task force. Requests for reinforcements by General Articus had been answered swiftly, and the fight over the planet had begun in earnest.

If Saren cared to look up, he'd see a blue sky filled with the dotted glows of hundreds of battles taking place miles overhead. While the boxy ships of the alien forces had proven to be a tough nut for the much more agile turian ships to beat, it had been doable. Up until the aliens had deployed those **things.** No doubt intel was busy trying to figure out how to properly label these new war machines the alien had brought onto the battlefield, but for Saren and the rest of the ground troops, they were simply known as those **things.**

As he popped his head out to get a swift glance at the approaching enemy, Saren's sharp eyes caught the dull dark silhouette of the 'humans'. It had taken almost five days before the translators had gotten a good enough hold of the surprisingly asari looking species language to even learn what they called themselves.

Saren's translator buzzed and squawked before the enemy's shout was translated. "…Here…Jaw!"

What in the spirits was that even supposed to mean? Ignoring his translator, Saren shouldered his Lancer and opened fire on the human with a controlled burst. The trusty rifle spat out half a dozen rounds that found it's target with accuracy born from a lifetime of practice. The enemy soldier jerked from the impact before falling to the ground. It's pained shouts were answered by more of the gruttal calls of it's comrades from afar and Saren had to duck back as a hail of return fire from the downed scout peppered his position.

His target may be down, but he certainly was not out of the fight just yet. For a species that did not have the basics of shield technology down, they made surprisingly good body armor that had proven very effective against mass altered rifle fire. A six round burst from a Lancer IV on most unshielded armor models that Saren knew of would have reduced it's owner to shreds.

From the way the human that had been shot was yelling and returning fire, it was apparent that either this new species was especially hardy, or their lack of shield technology had pushed for much better armor development to compensate.

Fighting an instinctive flinch as a round ricocheted inches from his head, the turian noble gave a sigh of relief when he saw his own backup arriving. Half a dozen fringed soldiers moved up into position around Saren. The bark of the single assault rifle variant from the downed enemy soldier had been joined by numerous others signaling the arrival of the enemy's squad mates.

Giving a grim smile, Saren once more popped his head out of cover. The human he had shot was dead, judging by the body's stillness and the pool of red around it's head. Looks like someone had opted for an easy kill. Spotting a human ducking out from behind the doorway of a shelled out building, Saren shouldered his rifle and opened fire. The rounds clipped the wall and send a cascade of dust onto the soldier, but the enemy did not falter. It's return fire forced Saren to once more duck back into the safety of cover.

Knowing the enemy now had a bead on his position, Saren shifted over to find a better suited spot to take aim from. As he moved out from behind the protection provided by the human tank, a fellow turian that had been crouching at the other end popped out of cover only to have his brain matter scattered across the ground in a spectacular spray of bone and gore.

The headless corpse fell to the ground and Saren had to fight back the urge to throw up as he crawled past. Whoever thought war was glorious obviously had never actually fought in a single battle outside of training exercises.

The firefight continued for another 10 minutes as both sides traded bullets and the occasional grenade.

Suddenly Saren's earpiece came to life. "Epsilon unit, fall back to perimeter lines. Tank division is moving up to support your position."

Instead of feeling relief, Saren could only grimace at the orders. The calm voice at the other end did not betray the fact that everyone knew. They were losing. Tank support would most likely only draw attention from on of those **things.**

And if those **things **showed up, Saren sure as hell didn't want to be anywhere near here. Firing a long burst from his rifle as he backed away from his piece of cover, Saren couldn't help but wonder when he was going to die. There was no question about it at this point, even if the entire Hierarchy fleet was brought in to clear up this mess, the troops stationed planet side would most likely be long dead before reinforcement could arrive.

The grind of massive wheels signaled the approach of their promised tank support. Saren felt only pity as he lopped past in the opposite direction the handful of tanks were headed in. The crews of those vehicles were doomed as soon as they gained the attention of those **things. **They probably knew it too, but like good turians they were following their orders trusting in the Hierarchy to spend their lives in a worthy fashion.

As the booms of the mass accelerated cannons echoed through the city Saren was retreating from, the turian could already imagine hearing the heavy thumping as those **things **moved to respond to the tanks. He did not envy the crew of those vehicles.


End file.
